Poison in our Communities: Impacts of the Nuclear Weapons Industry across America
In 1942, the United States formally began the Manhattan Project, which led to the production, testing, and use of nuclear weapons. In August 1945, the United States dropped two nuclear weapons on Japanese cities, killing around 200,000 people by the end of 1945 and leaving survivors with cancer, leukemia and other illnesses caused by radiation exposure. While this was their only use in wartime, states have detonated nuclear weapons many times since for testing purposes, producing radioactive fallout. Many U.S. nuclear weapons production activities, including the mining of uranium and testing of the weapons themselves, have occurred outside of the continental United States. Notably, explosive testing in the Pacific islands and ocean spread radioactive fallout to Marshallese, Japanese, and Gilbertese people, forcibly displacing entire communities and producing intergenerational illnesses.
Much of the scholarship surrounding the effects of nuclear weapons on environmental and human health is framed within a potential detonation scenario. For example, studies have shown that even a regional nuclear war would cause millions of immediate deaths and trigger a “nuclear winter,” a shift in the climate that would disrupt agricultural production, thus killing hundreds of millions more through starvation. Additionally, in 2024, the United Nations General Assembly voted to create an independent scientific panel to study the health, environmental and economic consequences of nuclear war. While such research is crucial for understanding the consequences of nuclear weapons use, nuclear weapons are built, maintained, and deployed everyday, impacting communities at every stage even before detonation. Studying only the predictive futures of the use of a nuclear weapon in war is insufficient in understanding nuclear weapons’ holistic humanitarian impact. According to former Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III, “The heart of American deterrence is the people who protect us and our allies. Here at STRATCOM, you proudly stand up—day in and day out and around the clock—to defend us from catastrophe and to build a safer and more peaceful future. So let us always ensure that the most dangerous weapons ever produced by human science are managed with the greatest responsibility ever produced by human government.” Nuclear deterrence theory contends that a retaliatory nuclear strike is so threatening that an adversary will not attack in the first place. Thus, nuclear advocates often suggest that these weapons protect American citizens and the U.S. homeland. This report demonstrates, however, that the creation and sustainment of the nuclear deterrent harms members of the American public. As the United States continues nuclear modernization on all legs of its nuclear triad through the creation of new variants of warheads, missiles, and delivery platforms, examining the effects of nuclear weapons production on the public is ever more pressing.
This report outlines a framework relying on “Cooperative Technical Means” for effective arms control verification based on remote sensing, avoiding on-site inspections but maintaining a level of transparency that allows for immediate detection of changes in nuclear posture or a significant build-up above agreed limits.
The grant comes from the Carnegie Corporation of New York (CCNY) to investigate, alongside The British American Security Information Council (BASIC), the associated impact on nuclear stability.
Satellite imagery of RAF Lakenheath reveals new construction of a security perimeter around ten protective aircraft shelters in the designated nuclear area, the latest measure in a series of upgrades as the base prepares for the ability to store U.S. nuclear weapons.
It will take consistent leadership and action to navigate the complex dangers in the region and to avoid what many analysts considered to be an increasingly possible outcome, a nuclear conflict in East Asia.